Gordon and Sarah Brown share their old school photos for #UpForSchool campaign

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Gordon and Sarah Brown have shared school pictures of themselves
It is part of social media campaign called #UpForSchool by Sarah's charity
Charity has petition asking world leaders give education to every child

Published: 04:16 EST, 5 March 2015 | Updated: 10:30 EST, 5 March 2015

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The chubby-faced boy grinning happily at the camera in a slightly-crumpled school uniform is an image that millions of families up and down the UK have sitting on their mantelpiece.

But few of those children go from dodging their homework and playing hopscotch in lunch break to ruling the country.

Gordon Brown has now shared the school photo that he had taken aged five when he was a pupil at Kirkcaldy West Primary School.

Gordon and Sarah Brown shared their old school pictures as part of social media campaign called #UpForSchool by the initiative A World At School, which Sarah co-founded. (Pictured left: Gordon Brown, aged five, pictured right: Sarah Brown, aged 11)

The former PM shared the snap as part of a social media campaign organised by his wife Sarah Brown, to push for better education for girls in the developing and third world.

Sarah, who runs the charity Theirworld and is the co-founder of the initiative A World At School, also shared her old school photo on Twitter with the hashtag #UpForSchool.

The aim of the campaign is to attract signatures for the initiative's upforschool.org petition, which will be delivered to world leaders in September to ensure they keep a promise they made in 2000 to get every girl and boy into school and learning by the end of 2015.

The petition has already attracted three million signatures on their site.

The actress and comedian Miranda Hart has also shared a picture of herself as a child with the words: 'My old school photo (hot) to support International Women's Day and #UpForSchool.'

Miranda Hart as a school child left, and at the Glamour Women of the Year Awards in London, in June 2013, right

TOWIE star Lydia Bright's (right) mother Debbie also posted a picture of her daughter at school (left)

The petition reads: 'Every child has the right to go to school, without danger or discrimination.

'Help create a message no government, politician or leader can ignore and demand that every child can go to school safely. Nothing changes without pressure.

'We are standing up to bring an end to the barriers preventing girls and boys from going to school, including forced work and early marriage, conflict and attacks on schools, exploitation and discrimination.

'All children deserve the opportunity to learn and achieve their potential.'

Education of girls not only further their independence, it also cuts the rate of child deaths, teen pregnancy and helps to provide more stable families.

Illiteracy among women contributes to greater numbers of preventable child deaths.

A child born to literate mother is 50 per cent more likely to survive past the age of five than a child born to an illiterate mother.

Find out more about the Rise #UpForSchool campaign

Left: Gordon Brown speaks at Dumbarton Town hall to No campaigners last September in Glasgow, right: Sarah Brown at a 'Girl Rising' Screening at BAFTA in April 2013

Education also has a great impact on sexual and reproductive health outcomes for girls and women.

In many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, for example, the birth rate among girls with no education is over 4x higher than those with secondary education.

Providing education for girls also helps to fuel economic growth of a country.

An educated female population increases a country's productivity, yet some countries lose more than £650 million a year by failing to educate girls to the same level as boys.

For example, if all girls in Kenya completed primary education, their additional output would equal 20 per cent of Kenya’s GDP.

If all adolescent girls completed secondary education and delayed pregnancy until their twenties, this would add £2 billion to the Kenyan economy every year.

Join the petition at www.upforschool.org